Without checks?

After exactly 150 recorded nights in my journal, I finally had a lucid dream. Unfortunately, I forgot quite a lot of it, but not the basic stuff.

Anyway, the odd thing was how I became lucid. In my dream I was sitting down in a chair, then I just stood up and looked down on the table below me and from completely nothing I realized I was dreaming. No reality checks or anything of that kind. So I was wondering, have any of you experienced a scene where you realize you're dreaming without even checking?

My excitement nearly got me and I was on a very fine line between staying in and waking up, but I managed to hold it in for another (what felt like) 2 minutes.

Hah, I feel not so discouraged, now. Just had a glimpse of lucidity last night, but I've also been trying for at least 300 days, but not with much devotion in between parts.

I've never become lucid that way, in fact my first lucid dream, which happened just before waking up about a year ago, simply occured. I just remember thinking 'Darn, I'm waking up, (hey, this is a dream)'

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So I was wondering, have any of you experienced a scene where you realize you're dreaming without even checking?

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Yeah, that's actually fairly common from what I've read in the forum. I for one never became lucid from a check, if I remember correctly. I've used RC to confirm what I already knew or to "ground" myself to the dream but other than that...

Congrats on your lucid, btw. :)

Yeah, on the 7th I was trying to WILD but fell asleep and 5 minutes later I just knew I was dreaming because my mind was still on WILDing and on the 9th I just knew for absolutely no reason at all, I was just doing something in my dream then suddenly thought "Hey, I'm dreaming :S"

I think this is actually quite common.

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Originally Posted by Vlad

In my dream I was sitting down in a chair, then I just stood up and looked down on the table below me and from completely nothing I realized I was dreaming.

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First of all, congratz!
And to your other question, well, exactly the same thing happened to me in my third and last LD :D
I was sitting on my chair, stood up, and kind of knew that I was dreaming without doing any sort of RC. It was like being teleported directly from my bed to that place.

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Originally Posted by Ethereal

but not with much devotion in between parts.

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Same story here. I became slightly less enthusiastic after the first 60 or so days. Nevertheless, I don't really make strong attempts to lucid dream anymore; I only try to consider the possibility that I'm dreaming once every while.

Anyway, I'm interested that I'm not the only one that has had this, and I never actually knew it was possible to LD without some sort of check.

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Originally Posted by Vlad

Anyway, I'm interested that I'm not the only one that has had this, and I never actually knew it was possible to LD without some sort of check.

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RCing just increases your chances either by:

1 - happening in a non-lucid because you're so used to it all the time IRL and thus giving you "The Hint"

2 - making you lucid "just like that" because it keeps you thinking about lucidity all the time IRL and letting your brain know what you're after

Hope this clarifies a bit. :)

A lot of times this happens. It's important to be faithful in writing down every aspect of your dreams. What this will do is wire into your brain to look out for certain aspects of dreams.

Spoiler for A lot of information and ranting:

At this point, your subconscious will begin to collect a database of certain things that happen when you're dreaming. They'll probably be so small, you wouldn't even be able to consciously recognize them. They may be small things like the way your body reacts to something, a lack of a certain hormone in your blood, or something in the dream, like the way people speak, a lack of intellectual stimulation, etc. It will combine all of these and look for them. It's actually very similar to what we commonly refer to as intuition.

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Originally Posted by oniman7

It's important to be faithful in writing down every aspect of your dreams. What this will do is wire into your brain to look out for certain aspects of dreams.

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I only have one small problem with that. When my memory goes blurry, I can no longer distinct between what actually happened, and what I'm making up.

That's fine. With constant training, your brain will be learn to distinguish. It's a valuable evolutionary development. Basically, write down everything you think you dreamed about. Put it down, and walk away for at least a few hours. Come back, and then scrutinize it again. If you can no longer remember dreaming it, or you can't connect it sequentially to another part of your dream (IE you went from walking to being ripped apart, without even a transition) then cross it out/delete it. This will train you to remember more efficiently and effectively.